Of Neckerchiefs and Ties
by Yuxume
Summary: Little girl Claire Farron comes across a man and his crying son. It's ironic and amazing how small the world can be, at times.


**That's right. IT'S ANOTHER SHORT FLUFF STORYYYYY. This little idea popped into my head when I should've been doing homework. **

**The title's a pun, but it's not a very obvious one, so don't sweat it. **

**Hope you enjoy. ^^**

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><p>"Sissss~!" A voice wailed. A tiny little pink-haired girl, age five, her hair up in a "bunny-tail," went careening into her older sister, crying. She held out her elbow to the older girl, where a scrape had begun to bleed. "It hurts, <em>it hurts!<em>" She began to cry even harder, the tears pouring from her blue eyes and down her cheeks. The dirt on her pink dress, embroidered with flowers, indicated that she had tripped and fallen down.

"Serah, don't cry!" The older girl, who was eight years old, turned and patted Serah on the head consolingly. "We'll go home soon, and Mommy will make the pain go away." The girl had a ponytail much longer than her sibling's skinny hairstyle, and she wore blue overalls over a pink, long-sleeved shirt.

"Claire~! Serah~!" A lady's voice came calling over the playground the two sisters had been playing at. Claire, the older sister, turned around, returning the call. "Mommy! We're over here!"

A beautiful, red-haired woman came striding over a hill. "Oh, Serah, honey, what are you crying about now?" Rushing over, Abby Farron comforted her youngest daughter while she appraised the wound with emerald green eyes. "Don't cry about this, Serah. Here, I have band-aids right here, let Mommy wash it, okay? There's a water fountain over there... Claire, you have dirt on your face. Here." The lady placed a green cloth in her hands, and the young girl inspected the black patterns on the lovely neckerchief.

"Mommy, it'll get dirty if I use it!"

"It's alright, Claire, we'll just wash it... Go on. The water fountain's right over there, so you can play some more, but don't go too far!" Mrs. Farron herded Serah off to the fountain to wash her scrape, leaving Claire behind, still scrutinizing her mother's green bandana.

"It'll get dirty if I use it..." Claire muttered stubbornly. She put the silky cloth in her overalls pocket, and wiped at her face with her sleeve instead. Sobs, though not from Serah, soon drew the little girl's attention once again.

Claire's father had died when she was very young, when she was only about Serah's age. She didn't remember much about him. But, she knew her mother had been very sad for a very long time. After her mama stopped crying so much, she told Claire she had to work longer, so Claire would need to be a good big sister for Serah.

Claire had fiercely abided by this request, and now, any crying at all brought her over like a magnet. One time, when Claire was seven, the family of three had been standing in line at a movie theater, waiting to watch "The Panda and I," which Claire had desperately wanted to see. Serah, naturally, had simply wanted to follow her older sister. A baby boy had begun to bawl, and the mother was desperately trying, in vain, to calm her son. Claire had immediately marched over, ignoring her own mother's inquiries of where she was going, and stood in front of the stroller, staring in at the child. Spinning around, she had shouted, hands on hips and bellowing at the top of her lungs, _**"HE NEEDS TO HAVE HIS DIAPER CHANGED!"**_

The stunned woman, and the amazed crowd, could only gape at this tiny, pink-haired girl, glaring indignantly at her, before Claire's mother hurried over and, with many apologies, hauled her eldest daughter away.

And so, it was with an intrepid stride that the youngster set off to quell whatever sobbing beast lay before her. The "beast" turned out to be just a wee baby, with green, teary eyes and light-colored, almost white, fuzz on his head. He was sitting in his stroller, not wailing, like Serah had, just crying in a very quiet, forlorn sort of way. His father sat near him, trying to find out what was wrong. He wiped at his son's tears, patted his hair, and spoke to him in a soothing tone of voice. The man did not, however, see what Claire saw. Behind the stroller, lying in the dirt, was a small robot toy. Clearly, the baby had dropped his toy and, unable to get it back, began to get upset.

Picking up the figurine, Claire held it up to the man. "Excuse me, your son dropped his toy." The man gasped and took it from her. "Oh, thank you!" He was about to hand it back to his son, who was making eager noises, holding his hands out for his precious action figure, when another chubby hand reached out.

"Wait!" Claire leaped up, snatching back the figurine. "It has _dirt_ all over it! If you give it to him, he'll get _sick!_ Mommy said you always have to wash dirt off, or else the germs will come and it'll be bad..."

Pulling the green kerchief out of her pocket, Claire shoved both the cloth and toy into the father's hands again. A bit taken back by the straight forwardness of such a young child, the man took the two objects hesitantly. "Oh... Goodness, thank you..."

Claire continued her lecture. "Before he eats, you have to wash his hands, and after he comes home, he has to wash his hands! Mommy, Mommy said that it's _very _important, because germs can make little kids sick. I _always _wash me and Serah's hands when I get home, because I'm, because I'm a big sister." In her excitement, she began stuttering over her words slightly.

"Ohhh, I see! You sound like a very good big sister!" Claire smiled, and the man smiled back. "I don't know if I can be a good father to this little boy... And if I can't..."

Claire gasped, and then began to jump up and down, howling, "_It's not a question of can or can't!" _The man started, and looked at Clare with wide eyes.

"Mommy, Mommy always says that! 'It's not a question of can or can't.' I don't know what it means, but whenever, whenever I say I can't do something, Mommy always says that."

"Well, your mother sounds like a very smart woman."

"Yeah! My mommy's the smartest woman in the whole world!"

"Speaking of your mother, is that her?"

Abby came pelting over, red hair flying, Serah in her arms, a panda band-aid on her scrape. "Oh, I am so sorry, has she been bothering you? I apologize, it's probably because you have a child, she has these tendencies, you see. Claire, I've told you, you _can't do that!_"

"Oh, no, it's quite alright." The man waved away her apologies. "She's a very intelligent, energetic child."

"Thank you, I'm so sorry once again. Claire, we have to go. You have a horse-back riding lesson in twenty minutes. Please excuse us." The woman led Claire away, still lecturing her.

"Honey, who was that?" A silvery-blond haired female approached the man and child, clearly their wife and mother. The baby bounced up and down upon the sight of her, and she scooped him up into her arms.

"I'm not really sure... Her name was Claire, I believe? Oh, dear..." He looked down at the kerchief and toy in his hands. "I forgot to give her back her handkerchief."

"Bartholomew!" The woman held her son with one arm and put her other hand on her hip. "You're just _too_ forgetful, sometimes."

"It was an honest mistake, Nora, I'll go give it back to them..." Bartholomew stood and ran after Abby and her kids. She was nowhere in sight, though, and a blue car was driving away into the distance.

He groaned, putting a palm to his forehead. "Oh, man... Missed 'em."

In the car, Claire's mother sighed. "Don't _do_ that anymore, okay, Claire?" The sullen child in the back grumbled her assent. "Do you have my handkerchief?"

"I gave him it so he could get rid of the germs..."

"What? Oh, Claire, you couldn't have...!" The red-haired woman sighed, thinking about going back and getting it. "Oh, well... We'll just let them have it. But, Claire, you can't go talking to strangers!"

"His baby was crying!"

"Claire, I told you, you can't go chasing after every crying person on the planet!"

"Not a question of can or can't!"

"Oh, come on, that's not what I meant!"

Serah, who had been trying to sleep in her car seat through all this, suddenly yelled out, "_Be quiet! Sleepy time!"_ before turning to look out the window in an irritated huff.

There were a few moments of silence before Claire mumbled, "Look what you did, Mommy." Abby groaned.

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><p><em>Thirteen years later:<em>

Claire Farron, now Lightning Farron or Light for short, stood at the market in Bodhum. It was nearly her birthday, and Serah had dragged her out to go shopping a few days before the huge firework show was supposed to start.

As she was poring over some medicine in a herb shop, Light happened to glance over and catch sight of a fair-haired boy, his silver locks waving in the slight breeze as he joked with his mother. They were standing in front of a chocobo pen, looking over the yellow birds, laughing and talking. His face resembled his mother's, Lightning noted, their light-colored hair and green eyes matching.

As he turned once more to speak to his parent, Light caught sight of a green kerchief tied around his neck, hanging over his black shirt. She blinked in mild surprise. There was something niggling in the back of her brain, but she couldn't quite figure out why it was suddenly demanding her attention so. That neckerchief sure look familiar...

"Sis!" Serah jerked at her sister's arm, pulling her out of her reverie. "What in the world are you staring at? I must've called your name at least three times!"

"Hm? Ah, nothing. What is it?" Light allowed herself to be pulled away, the boy and his green kerchief momentarily forgotten. As the boy and his mother walked away from the chocobo pen, still chatting, Light and Serah went the opposite way, towards a jewelry shop Serah had found. The older sibling spared the boy one last thought before the whole situation was jolted out of her mind by the arrival of Snow.

_That boy... I feel like I'm sort of connected to him, somehow._

She had no idea.

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><p><strong>This was written on a total whim, and I wrote it in about half an hour, so please excuse any typo's I've made along the way, and the length of this story. Sudden, spontaneous ideas for the win!<strong>

**After I received some reviews from a couple of my lovely friends, I figured I should do some cleaning up:**

**I tried making Claire sound as much like an 8 year old as possible. I know for a fact that I actually didn't know it was "_ and I" instead of "me and _" until... 6th grade? :P Whoops. But, yeah, that bad grammar is intentional.**

**Another thing is that this isn't AU, or whichever two letters mean they don't follow the actual game plot. The last few paragraphs that happen thirteen years later is a few weeks before the fireworks show in Bodhum. I wanted this story to coincide with the facts as closely as possible, so I looked some stuff up on Final Fantasy Wiki. In some sort of Drama CD (what is that?), apparently a few days before the fireworks show, Light sees Hope and Nora shopping, and observes that their faces are very similar.**

**This is _before _the fireworks, so they haven't gotten on the Purge Train. Meaning Nora hasn't died, yet.**

**Also, a neckerchief is basically a handkerchief. Around your neck. ^_^b So don't get confused!**

**That's it, basically. I'm sorry, I only realized how confusing this story could be after I read my reviews. Hope (hahaha... Hope.) this clears stuff up!**


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